Month: June 2017

Today’s shooting involving Republican members of Congress and some of their aides and friends at a small baseball field in Alexandria, Virginia, is a terrible, detestable action. All shootings are, and it was refreshing to see people from different places on the political spectrum come together at a human level to console and comfort each other and their families, and to rightfully condemn something for which there is never a legitimate excuse. I suspect it will not be long before today’s incident will become a political football tossed back and forth in our country’s endless debate about guns. But perhaps today’s incident, because it appears to be tied to politics, might give us a space to reflect for just a moment on something that probably contributed to what happened today.

For many years, now, we have lived in a climate of increasingly polarized politics. Politicians and others of all political stripes have increasingly demonized those with whom they do not agree. People have called their opponents names, they have suggested that their opponents are morally bankrupt, and some have even suggested that their opponents are not really human. And, there have been suggestions by some — at time veiled, at times quite open — that the world would be better off if their opponents were dead. And it appears that today, someone took that suggestion seriously.

Human beings are profoundly linguistic creatures. Language fundamentally shapes and orders our reality. And when the language of politics and public discourse becomes characterized by hatred and violence, then that discourse helps to shape a reality in which hatred and violence are seen as somehow acceptable. That old saying, “Sticks and stones may break my bones but names will never hurt me,” is wrong on a number of levels. Violent, hateful names and words do hurt — and when we hear them so often that they begin to shape our reality, those words can be translated into actions.

Human beings have always had disagreements, and always will. The American political landscape will always include disagreement and debate. But it is one thing to disagree with someone, and another thing to cease to value them as human beings. We live today in a culture that has been shaped too much by language that undermines the humanity of those with whom we disagree, and when we are able to stop seeing someone’s humanity, we can more easily decide to do them harm.

There have certainly been much worse shooting incidents in this country than the one we saw today. But perhaps the fact that this particular incident was directed against members of Congress will cause our political establishment to take notice, and to realize that today’s incident is a symptom — a symptom of a culture of political discourse that gives permission to hate, to demonize, and, ultimately, to do violence. Politicians bear a lot of responsibility in changing that political discourse. But all of us, as citizens, share that responsibility, as well.

Ultimately, the heart of Christianity — and all religious traditions — is to bring about a transformation of the human person. Whatever one’s religion or non-religion, the great spiritual task of every human being is to face the darker parts of ourselves and to bring them into the light. When we become trapped in hateful, demonizing language, we not only impact the culture around us, but we also impact our own spiritual condition. Often, we like to begin by trying to change others — something that we cannot easily do, if at all. But we can change ourselves, we can recognize the negativity in us that spills out of us, and we can work on transforming that into something that shapes ourselves and the culture around us in positive ways. The need to take that spiritual work seriously has never been more evident.

‘Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?’ He said to him, ‘ “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.” This is the greatest and first commandment. And a second is like it: “You shall love your neighbour as yourself.” On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.’ — Matthew 22:36-40

In Matthew 7:21, Jesus says, “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven.” To understand the full implications of this teaching, we must recognize that the ‘kingdom of heaven’ is not a place where we go when we die, but rather, it is a state of being into which we are drawn through our following of Jesus, a state of being which alters all of our relationships — with ourselves, with others, with our world — in a Christ-like direction. We must also appreciate that, in this teaching, Jesus elevates doing over believing. One does not, he says, enter the state of being referred to by the kingdom of heaven just by calling Jesus “Lord” — which signifies adherence to a set of beliefs that make that title meaningful. Rather, it is putting into action the values of the kingdom of heaven as one follows Jesus as Lord that brings one into the new set of transformative relationships that constitute entry into the kingdom.

It is important, I think, that we appreciate the full depth of this particular teaching of Jesus on this day when the President has withdrawn the United States from the landmark Paris Climate Treaty that was concluded among 195 countries two years ago. Because many of those who have brought about that decision call Jesus “Lord.” And yet, the justification provided for this decision would indicate that they are very far from the kingdom of heaven.

The justification given for withdrawing from the Paris Treaty is, in the end, about selfishness — which, of course, was the very argument that brought the current administration to power. It all comes down to “America First” — and so it does not matter what the rest of the world thinks, nor does the health of our planet matter, nor does the well-being of the whole human community. It only matters whether it serves our own narrow interests as Americans. Putting aside the fact that, in the long run, the provisions of the Paris Treaty will aid the health of the planet and, thereby, serve our interest as human beings who live here, to put forth such an argument as the basis of exiting an international treaty is the very definition of selfishness, and caters to the basest of national instincts. All of this is the culmination of years of skepticism about the science of climate change on the part of large parts of the American population, most of whom also accept a narrative which places science and religion in opposition to each other, which venerates ignorance above learning, and, as one politician proclaimed early this week, believes that if climate change is really happening, God will save us from it.

Has it not occurred to anyone that the gift of human intellect upon which science, and so much else, depends, is God’s way of saving us?

It seems necessary to offer a reminder that selfishness is not a Christian virtue. The whole of Jesus’ life and teaching points to the exact opposite of selfishness, embracing the virtue of self-giving, and of putting others’ needs before our own. In no way is there any justifiable Christian theology that supports this idea of “America First”, no authentic Christianity that justifies putting the perceived, short-term self-interest of a few million people ahead of the well-being of an entire planet of billions.

To love God with one’s whole being, and to love one’s neighbor as one’s self, is the basic ethical stance of the authentic Christian tradition. It is the ethic that Jesus taught and on which he based his life. It is the putting of that ethic into action that opens the doors of the kingdom of heaven, that brings us into the state of being that Jesus calls us to. That ethic does not give us permission to love ourselves more than our neighbors, nor does it give us permission to adopt a narrow definition of “neighbor” that begins and ends at the American border.

I am not proud today to now be part of one of the few countries in the world that has turned its back on the biggest crisis to face humanity, choosing to hide behind the tribal wall of an increasingly ugly nationalism. And I am angry to be connected with those who use the name of Jesus and the Christian tradition to defend the selfishness that nationalism promotes.

Jesus also said we must love our enemies — and that is hard to do on a day like today. And I wonder how much love we will get from the rest of the world, when the United States has today become an enemy of the planet.

Let no one dare to say that what has been done today is somehow consistent with the Christian faith. It is not. It is simply being selfish.